


Thursday's Child Has Far to Go

by biextroverts



Series: Spacekru 7 + 1 [2]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Children, F/M, Gen, Post-Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-09
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-11-11 11:30:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 11,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11147514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/biextroverts/pseuds/biextroverts
Summary: Nearly five years into their stay on the Ring, Spacekru gets visitors. As the tags suggest, a post-s4 speculative/canon divergent fic.OFFICIALLY ABANDONED





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Ask and ye shall receive (aka, this fic is dedicated to all the people who expressed interest in a continuation of/sequel to It Takes A Village. This is for you, y'all. Please keep on commenting).

          “Monty,” Raven says, “I need you to get under the table and connect some wires for me.”

          Monty focuses instantly. He drops to his stomach and worms his way under the table, legs sticking out like he's the Wicked Witch of the East and Raven/Dorothy has just dropped a house on him. Sonia watches him curiously, and Harper murmurs quiet reassurances to the little girl. “What wires?” Monty asks.

          “Find the thickest wire,” Raven says, waiting until she hears Monty's “uh huh” to continue with her directions. “Good. That's the power cord. Now, plug it into the computer.”

          “The computer? Raven, there's, like, fifty computers down here.”

          “Eighteen,” Harper says.

          “Okay, Raven says, “but there's a computer that's the main computer, and I need you to plug the cord into that one.” Raven turns to Harper, who is rubbing Sonia's hand with her thumb. “Are these things numbered?”

          “I think so,” Harper says.

          “Okay, then it'll be computer one, or A, or alpha. Look around.”

          “It's a little dark down here.”

          “Well, try, goddammit, Monty!” Raven snaps. Harper shoots her a look, and Raven takes a deep breath, rolling her shoulders back to relieve them of tension. “Sorry. Computer one. Come on. You got this.”

          “Yeah,” Monty says shakily, “I got this.” There's the sound of him twisting and turning around on the floor for a few moments, the friction of cloth against metal, and then Monty says “got it!” and, a moment later, the monitors spark to life. Raven scans the room for the keyboard and control monitor, finding them both in the lower left-hand corner of the wall of screens, and she goes to turn on the cameras and bring up their feeds.

          “Monty, Harper,” Raven says, “keep your eyes on the screens. Tell me when I get eyes on Bellamy and Echo and Murphy and Emori, and on the airlock – we need to know who the –” she catches herself just in time to avoid swearing – “heck is out there.” Raven goes down the list of cameras, activating them one by one – she doesn't have time to search for whatever would turn them all on at once. Camera seven gives them a view of Murphy and Emori, the latter rummaging through quarters they've never entered while the former stands guard outside. Camera eleven apparently gives them both their other pairs of eyes at once, because Harper points out Bellamy and Echo at the same time as Monty says, tensely, “Raven, I still don't know who the hell they could be, but the intruders have boarded the Ring.” Raven comes quickly to rejoin Monty and Harper where they stand with Sonia between them, each holding one of her hands. She has to crane her neck to see the screen. Bellamy and Echo, the latter wielding a shard of a broken vase, the former only his fists, are up against four people in orange spacesuits with something written in black along the right arm. They are, Raven notes with displeasure and not a bit of surprise, not in the airlock, but on the border of the residential zone.

          “Shit,” Raven says.

          “What do we do?” Monty asks, looking to Raven.

          “You stay here with Sonia,” Raven says, continuing quickly before Monty has the chance to cut her off. “Don't come out until we've forced the intruders to retreat.” She turns to Harper. “Harper, you're the fighter here; go provide Bellamy and Echo with backup.” Harper drops Sonia's hand with some reluctance, but nods resolutely.

          “And you?”

          “I'll track down Murphy and Emori; Murphy's no good in a fight, so I'll tell him to come here to you and Sonia, Monty. Emori, we get to even our ranks. Four on four. And no one beats our Grounders in a fight, or Bellamy, or you, Harper. Certainly not when you're all on the same side. Now, let's move.” Raven stamps the floor with her good foot; Monty salutes, as does Harper, before she takes off. Raven smiles at the both of them before herself heading odd in the direction of the residential corridors farther from the airlock, where she knows, thankfully, that Murphy and Emori can be found. She pushes herself as hard as she can without running; her leg starts to ache, but she ignores it, and finds Murphy and Emori after a few minutes. “Hey,” she says, out of breath.

          Murphy jumps and grabs the shock baton in his belt – where did he get that? Whatever. Not right now. “It's just me,” Raven says, and Murphy relaxes a little; his face betrays relief.

          “Raven, the cameras up?”

          “Yeah.” The tightness in Raven's face must show, judging by the way Murphy's brow crinkles with worry. “I need you to go back to the guard room,” Raven says. “Monty and Sonia are there. Stay with them. Emori?”

          Emori's head appears from the doorway to the quarters. “Raven” she says, eyes and tone alike clouding when she sees Raven's expression.

          “We're going to the guard –” Murphy begins to tell her, before Raven cuts him off.

          “You're coming to the other end of the residential zone with me. That's where Bellamy, Echo, and Harper are; there are four of whoever these intruders are, and we need you to even the playing field.”

          “Of course,” Emori says.

          “I'm not heading to relative safety without Emori,” Murphy protests.

          Raven shakes her head at him. “Murphy, you can't fight for shit. Emori's skilled with her knife, and with her hands. These are the best places for you each. Now get going to the guard room, and stay with Monty and your daughter. Emori –” Raven juts her chin in the direction in which she was heading when she found the pair of them – “come on.”

          Emori nods and follows Raven; Murphy watches them for a second, only turning to follow Raven's directions when Emori stops, looks over her shoulder, and says “go.” Then Raven and Emori continue to hurry down the corridor. Raven grits her teeth and tries to ignore the fact that her leg feels like it's on fire and tears are sliding from her eyes.

          “I can get there from here,” Emori says, stopping and laying her hands on Raven's elbows to still Raven as well. “Go back to the guard room, Raven.”

          Raven is reluctant to relinquish command. “Are you sure?”

          “You won't be an asset to a fight if you don't have your bombs and you can't even walk.” It's businesslike, purely pragmatic, but Raven laughs weakly.

          “Point taken,” Raven says, and Emori gives her a curt nod and takes off at a run. Raven rests against the wall for a few moments, her whole body aching, then limps off to the guard room at as fast a pace as she can manage, nearly dragging her bad leg behind her. Murphy, Monty, and Sonia are there waiting for her. When she enters, Murphy and Monty look up, anxious, and Sonia's gaze follows theirs, although she doesn't quite understand what's going on.

          “Is everything okay out there?” Monty asks.

          “I don't know; check the screens.” Raven finds the lone office chair in the room and sits down hard, sending the seat gliding across the floor with the force of her body. “I just couldn't make it to the fight scene. My leg.” She stretches the offending limb and groans a curse at the pain.

          “You going to be all right?” Murphy asks, looking up at her from where he's crouched on the floor next to Sonia.

          “Yeah. Just need to not walk.” Raven spins herself over to the control monitor and switches it to show the feeds from cameras eleven and twelve. She watches them for what seems like days, although it's probably only an hour or so; every so often, Monty or Murphy will take a break from playing with Sonia and come over to stare worriedly at the screen with Raven. Sometimes it seems like their crew is winning, but then the intruders gain the advantage again and Raven goes back to biting down on her lip so hard it bleeds. When she starts picking her cuticles with an intensity that leaves little ribbons of skin peeling from her fingertips, Monty comes up behind her and lays a comforting hand on her shoulder, which means he's there to watch as a fifth intruder enters camera eleven's field of view, holding a canister of something that, when released with the press of a button, causes all of their people to swoon. Raven and Monty trade a look, lips pursed and brows taut. “Shit,” Raven says.

          “Shit,” Monty repeats.

          “Language,” Murphy snaps. His voice softens, and he speaks to Sonia for a moment. “Daddy's gonna go see what Raven and Monty are looking at, okay, honey? I'll be right back, I promise.”

          “Okay, daddy,” Sonia says, and Murphy stands, coming to Raven's other side. His eyes widen as he takes in the scene on the screen.

          “Shit,” Murphy says.

          “Language,” Monty mutters. Murphy snorts. “What do we do now?” Monty asks, refocusing on Raven, who bites down on her raw and bloody lip.

          “I don't know,” she says finally, looking up at Murphy and Monty behind her. When her gaze goes back to the screen, she realizes that there are now only three intruders standing around the unconscious forms of Bellamy, Echo, Harper, and Emori. “Where did the others go?” she asks the boys, but they've been looking at her. Footsteps echo in the distance, growing closer, and Murphy dives for Sonia, wrapping his arms around her and picking her up with a strength the belies his lean form and generally unremarkable athletic abilities. Raven stands, and she and Monty go together to bar the doorway. Then everything that Raven knows goes hazy, and everything goes black.


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spacekru wake up in a strange room and try to open a door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Said's not dead.
> 
> Also, in posting this update, I've successfully written and published a second chapter of something for the first time, so three cheers for me. Let's hope it lasts.

          Everything is black, and his head hurts like hell, like radio static is turned up to top volume in his brain. Bellamy can't see, or hear, or even think about anything but the agony he's in for several minutes, until the pounding disperses enough that he can feel, though still vague and distant, the hand on his shoulder, shaking him, and hear the nervous voice that accompanies it: “Bellamy? Bellamy? Bellamy?”

          “Eh?” Bellamy blinks his eyes open, and his vision resolves slowly from a swimming, fuzzy image to a clear picture of the scene. It's Raven's voice that's been accompanying the hand on his shoulder, and Raven's hand as well; she's kneeling over him as he lies on the floor, frown set and brow knit. When she sees him looking at her, she smiles, and goddamn if it's not the most beautiful thing Bellamy's ever seen in his life. He blinks up at her, thoughts still blurred; he remembers fighting – something, someone – alongside Echo, Harper, and Emori, and then the world spinning, and then waking up now with his head aching and Raven's face hovering anxiously over his. “What happened?” he croaks, and Raven grimaces.

          “We wish we knew.” That's Murphy's voice. Raven helps Bellamy lift his head slightly to look around. Murphy and Emori sit a yard or so away, holding hands and watching over Sonia protectively as Sonia plays quietly with Clarke. Echo stands across from them, on Bellamy's other side; she stares intently at Sonia, as if she's afraid the girl will vanish if her vigilance wavers for even a second. Near Raven's feet sits Monty, watching as Harper paces back and forth around the little room. Bellamy frowns, urging Murphy to go on. “Whoever those intruder bastards were,” Murphy continues, seeming to have forgotten his rule about swearing in front of Sonia, “they had some powerful airborne sedatives at their disposal, and they knocked us all out. Presumably, that means we're on their ship, unless there's some super secret room on the Ring you forgot to mention to the rest of us.” Murphy looks pointedly at Bellamy, who shakes his head. “All right. I thought not, but it was worth a try. Anyways, we still don't know who they are or why they kidnapped us, but that seems to be the situation at hand.”

          “Their spacesuits said Eligius,” Bellamy says, remembering.

          “Does that mean anything?” asks Monty.

          “Dunno. But that's what they said.”

          Raven stands up, dusting off her hands. “It's an old ship,” she says, beginning to pace; she and Harper nearly crash into each other, and Harper steps back, allowing Raven to pass her. Bellamy sits up fully; he's been lying on a pile of towels, he realizes with some confusion. Raven goes on. “If you listen to the hum of the engine, you can tell it's running on a combination of solar energy and biofuel – no idea where they got that, but. It's got four thrusters, and, unless there's another floor above or below us, a pretty low ceiling, which would suggest the all-terrain rover model of ship from the late 2030s.”

          “Wow,” says Bellamy, nonplussed.

          “Yeah,” Raven doesn't seem particularly interested in the compliment; she gets right back to business, which is one of the things Bellamy has always admired about her. “Anyways, these –” she has reached the wall, and taps on something shaped like a sarcophagus that seems to be built into it – “are cryosleep chambers, which means that this thing was designed for deep-space missions. There was something Abby was talking about once … I don't remember. Anyways, there's twenty chambers in here; I don't know how many rooms of them there are throughout the ship, but I'd assume there was at least some gender segregation, so we'd be dealing with a crew of forty people, minimum.” Raven pauses. “The cryosleep chambers would also explain why there were people out there we didn't know about; they've probably been out in space for at least as long as the stations of the Ark were, including the time before they were the Ark, and then plus the six years since the Ark went to the ground.”

          “Damn,” Murphy says.

          “It would be useful if we knew what they wanted with us,” Emori muses, “or what Abby said on Earth.” When Raven makes an indignant noise and crosses her arms, Emori adds, “I'm not blaming you, Raven. It's only wishful thinking.”

          “Wishful thinking's not gonna help us,” Raven says. She walks over to a place in the wall where there's a seam in the metal; a door. “If we could get this damn door open,” Raven says angrily, swinging a kick at the offending obstacle with her good foot, “I'd say you and Murphy should go spy, find out what's what. But we can't –” she kicks again – “get the damn door open.”

          “Let me try,” Bellamy says, standing and walking over to where Raven stands fuming. He puts his hands against the door and presses the entire weight of his body into it. Nothing. He grits his teeth and puts more pressure into his push, still without results. “Damn it,” he says, resisting his own urge to try to kick the thing in.

          “You're telling me,” Raven says, swinging at the door once more. “We've been at this for hours.”

          “How long have you all been awake?”

          “Varies,” Raven says. “Murphy was up first, like an hour before the rest of us, he said. Then Sonia. Then Emori, Harper, Monty, Echo, and I, not in that order, but all within about half an hour of each other. That was, I don't know, maybe three hours ago?”

          “They took our things, too,” Emori tells Bellamy. “I'd have tried sliding my knife into the door's seam, but it wasn't on me when I woke up. All we have are ourselves, the clothes on our backs, and Clarke, for some reason.”

          “So our captors aren't so inhumane as to deprive a child of her toy,” Bellamy says. “Good to know.”

          Emori chuckles; Murphy snorts. Harper says, “be serious, Bellamy.” She's stopped and knelt with Murphy and Emori beside Sonia, and is asking quiet questions about the story Sonia is creating for Clarke.

          “We're pirates,” Sonia tells Harper, who nods, leaning forward.

          “Are you hunting for treasure?”

          “Yeah.”

          Bellamy tilts his head back and groans. “How are we supposed to find out anything more about these people when we're locked in a room by ourselves with no way of opening the door?”

          “That would be the problem,” Monty says. “We can't figure out a way find out anything more about these people.”

          “And without more information, we can't form any plan of attack or escape,” Raven adds. “Which means we can't do anything but sit here and wait and hope that the plan these people have for us doesn't involve letting us starve to death in this stupid fucking prison cell.”

          “We aren't dying,” Emori says, glaring up at Raven. “Don't even suggest it.” She turns her attention to Sonia and murmurs to her, hand resting reassuringly on Sonia's back. “We'll be fine, Sonia, yongon.” Emori looks at Raven again. “If they wanted us dead, they'd have killed us. They may have beat us on the Ring, but we gave a good fight, and that they brought the sedatives into play means they know it; anyone in that situation who had half a brain would know that to let us starve slowly would be to invite danger for no purpose.”

          Raven inhales deeply. “You're right,” she says. She groans, but sits down. “God, I hate it, but I guess all there is to do is wait.” Bellamy sits across from her and rubs her shoulder, attempting to knead out the tension there with his knuckles, and she lets out a satisfied noise. “You're a fucking godsend, Bellamy.”

          “Thanks,” Bellamy says.

          A beep sounds behind them, from the other side of the door, and Bellamy stands, helping Raven to her feet. Behind him, he can hear the other six clambering to their feet as well; from the corner of his eye, he spots Echo looking ferociously at the door. He and the other six adults stand with their eyes fixed on there, all in fighting stances; Sonia stands behind her parents, watching them in mild confusion. “Be ready for anything,” Bellamy says.

          Another beep, and the door slides open. It takes Bellamy a moment to look down – the five people in spacesuits they'd encountered on the Ring were all at least as tall as he was, broad and built for brute strength rather than speed or stealth. But the woman in front of them stands no taller than Raven or Harper or Emori – probably an inch or two shorter, in fact. She's not wearing a spacesuit and helmet, either, but rather simple beige pants and a short-sleeved shirt in the same color, and canvas shoes of that color as well. And, while not ancient, she's certainly past her prime – in her early to mid-sixties, with salt-and-pepper hair pulled back in a low ponytail from her olive-toned face. She doesn't carry any weapons that Bellamy can see, or look like much of a threat. “Good, you're all up,” the woman says. She doesn't look particularly severe, but her voice comes out curt, businesslike. None of them say anything; they wouldn't know what to say. “I'd apologize for the sedatives,” the woman continues, “but we had to get you aboard somehow, and we weren't warned you'd be such prolific fighters. We don't intend you to be prisoners on this ship, however – at least, no more than we are –” the woman lets out a brief, and relatively humorless, chuckle – “and therefore, we thought it was more fitting that you dine with us than be served here.” The woman turns on her heel, but stops to look over her shoulder when she doesn't hear footsteps following her. “Well?” she says. “Do you want to eat or not?”

          The seven of them look around at each other. Bellamy, Raven, Monty, Harper, and Echo's eyes finally settle on Murphy and Emori; this is their choice, the rest know, with the safety of their daughter, the only member of their party too young to defend herself, hanging in the balance. Murphy and Emori look at each other, and then, without speaking, each take one of Sonia's hands. Murphy nods. “Yeah,” he says. “Let's go not starve.”


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spacekru have an awkward dinner with their captors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be the change and write the fic you want to see in the world - aka, this is lots of Emori being clever and loving Murphy and Murphy being sappy about Emori, because those are my favorite things. I hope you enjoy them as well.

          Emori plays with her knife, trying to get used to get used to the weight and shape of it in her hand – it's a dinner knife, of course, so it isn't capable of much damage, but if anyone can wield it to effect, it's her, and a weak weapon is better than no weapon at all, when one is potentially surrounded by enemies. John watches their captors, measuring them up in the way she's taught him to do, and Echo seems to be studying them as well. The others don't appear to be as resourceful; Monty is engaging in eager conversation with the people who have kidnapped them, Harper is simply savoring the meal – the first thing any of them have eaten in nearly five years that isn't algae salad, Emori grants her – and Bellamy and Raven are watching Sonia as she savors hers, something Emori wishes she could join them in. She'll stop to enjoy her daughter's new experiences, though, only once she knows her daughter is safe; right now, at dinner with these strangers who incapacitated them, then locked them up for hours, this is no guarantee. Emori drives her knife into her roast beef, grown in some way the kidnappers are explaining to Monty that Emori couldn't follow if she tried, taking satisfaction in the way a twist of her wrist drives a hole from which blood seeps into the flesh. It won't do as much to the skin of the living, but she sincerely hopes she will not need to kill, so that's fine. She slips the knife, unnoticed, into her boot, picks up the fork, and spears some peas onto its tines, relishing the fresh, green taste. There is only so much even John can do with algae.

          “Hey,” John says, and Emori looks up, peas halfway to her mouth; John's blue eyes are steady, reassuring, even with her blood rushing as it is. “You okay?” he asks. 

          Emori shakes the dark thoughts from her head and nods. “Yes. Just a little overwhelmed.”

          “I feel like my taste buds are waking up from hibernation,” John says, and Emori laughs; John smiles at her and reaches under the table to squeeze her hand. “Come on,” he says, “let's add our sparkling wit to this conversation, stop Monty talking about cloning beef.” Emori looks at him with her brow furrowed, and he leans in to whisper in her ear, breath warm on her neck; “you know what they say about knowing your enemy.” She nods at him, then turns her attention to the crew of this ship on which she and hers are being held captive, smiling brightly. Bellamy and Raven stop making laughing conversation over Sonia to look at her in confusion – unlike these kidnappers, they know that Emori's open-mouthed smile is something she still reserves for John. Thankfully, they also know when to keep their mouths shut.

          “Thank you,” Emori says, “for inviting us to share your table.” The woman who opened the door for them earlier – Olivia, she thinks – smiles, hiding venom, calculation. The woman has to be near seventy, but she is the leader of the band of eight strangers, and she is deadly; Emori knows subtle, hidden strength when she sees it.

          “Of course,” Olivia says. “It's an honor to have you all at our table with us. It's been –” she turns to her followers – “what, one hundred and eighteen years since we last set foot on earth? Even with the simulation to remind us of home – and freedom – our memories of both have quite faded with time. For you, though, it's only been five years since last you set foot on that green planet.”

          “I wouldn't say the planet's all that green,” John says. “Or that all of us have much familiarity with freedom.” Under the table, Emori jabs him with her knee.

          “John,” Emori says, her voice that fake high and polite it used to be when she was playing at innocent young thing in a con with Otan, “be nice. We're guests here.” She raises her eyebrows at him: _you catch more flies with honey, John_. He nods almost imperceptibly. “Earth was great,” John says. He looks around the table at the others of their people. “Echo, what was your favorite thing about Earth?” he asks.

          “Snow,” Echo says, without hesitating. “New fallen. Not the soft snow that your feet sunk into and that stuck to the legs of your trousers, that was only an inconvenience, but the crisp snow, almost ice, really, that glittered in the light if you looked at it right.”

          “Good answer.” John nods. “Bellamy?”

          “The air, Bellamy says. “It fills your lungs the way the recycled stuff doesn't. The first thing I do back on Earth is going to be to take a deep, deep breath of that air, to inhale as long as I need until I feel full again.”

          “Storms,” Raven says, “the electricity in the atmosphere, those heavy clouds rolling in. God, I miss thunder and lightning.”

          “I miss plants,” Harper muses. “All of them.”

          “Poison ivy?” Monty asks, eyebrows quirked. Harper wrinkles her nose and shakes her head.

          “Except poison ivy.”

          “Poison ivy is proof all gods of nature left us long ago,” Olivia says.

          Harper chuckles. “Amen.” She looks to Monty where he sits next to her. “Monty?”

          Monty considers the question carefully for a moment, as he does most things. “Everything,” he says finally. “I miss everything. Everything was better on Earth.”

          Emori knows he's thinking about his friend he lost down there, and about the game he'd told the rest of them they used to play, “On Which Planet Would You Rather,” the one where the answer was always Earth. She wants to say something comforting, but she can't find the words, and she couldn't say them here, anyways, in public, in front of everyone. So instead, she speaks to the question John posed, drawing attention away from Monty and towards herself so that Monty has a moment to mourn.

          “I miss water running over stone,” Emori says, “and stone worn down by water. The sound of it, the feel of it … calm, smooth.” She remembers the streams that ran through the various caves in which she'd slept over the years, and the clean, fresh water they bore. She remembers the stream in the cave in which she'd first kissed John, especially, the stream over which their faces had come close when they'd raised them at the same time from washing, the stream into which she'd nearly fallen when their lips had met, and the way he'd laughed against her mouth, and she against his. That is her favorite stream, but she loves them all; the promise of life flowing through the constructions of heavy, lifeless stone. She looks up at John. “And you, question-poser?”

          “You know what my favorite thing was,” John says, and Emori rolls her eyes.

          “Aside from meeting me, John.”

          “Earth wasn't too kind to me aside from that,” John says, and Emori shakes her head fondly at him. “You were the one good thing.” She sighs, and he kisses her forehead, draws his hand along the side of her face to lift her chin, kisses her mouth. She presses into his touch, almost forgetting there are others there. John has that effect on her, sometimes, and she, she knows, has it on him.

          “No kissing at the table,” Bellamy says, reminding Emori that she and John aren't alone. “We've been over this.”

          Murphy pulls back to look at Bellamy. “Oh, like you've never –”

          “Not like you two.” Bellamy presses a quick kiss to Raven's temple, and Raven smiles. “Just like that.” It's a conversation they've had before, the two of them, one Emori and Raven like to sit back and enjoy, and for a moment it is just the eight of them on the Ring again, safe. Then Olivia chuckles, and Emori starts, and reaches down to where the knife she's taken from the table is hidden in her boot. All of them are looking across the table at their captors again.

          “I didn't mean to interrupt,” Olivia says, and John senses Emori's tension and reaches down to rub her knuckles; she allows him to keep her from grabbing for her weapon, for now. “I was just remembering the glow of my own young love. Of course, that didn't end so well – I wasn't one of the millions of falsely accused who were sent, along with those such as myself, into the labor force. But it was nice while it lasted.”

           John stops massaging Emori's knuckles and intertwines his fingers with hers, squeezing tight; now he is the one who needs to be held back from doing something that might later prove unwise. “Each love story's different,” he says, gritting his teeth at their host. “Ours isn't so temporary.” They've been together more than five years now, and it still makes her heart flutter every time John expresses his faith in _them_ , but now isn't the time for sentimentalism. She disentwines their fingers and lays her hand on John's shoulder.

          “John,” Emori says, her voice a warning, “Olivia was speaking for herself.” John exhales, bony shoulders falling from where they'd risen nearly to his ears.

          “You're right,” he says to Emori, and then, to Olivia, “apologies.”

          Olivia, chewing, nods. When she has finished her bite of food, she speaks, voice a constructed variety of nonthreatening. “It's quite all right,” she says. “I imagine you all are tired; sedative-induced sleep isn't the most resting form of unconsciousness, I'm afraid. If you're all done, I'll show you to your room. You'll have real beds, and an unlocked door, don't worry.”

          “Yes,” Emori says, pushing her plate towards the center of the table. “I think that would be good.” She stands from her chair, followed by Bellamy and Raven, and, when they have given the others their permission by following Emori's lead, Murphy, Monty, Harper, and Echo. Sonia is reluctant to leave the meal, and Emori's heart twists to deny her daughter, but she assumes they will eat of this table again tomorrow. For now, the most important thing is gathering their first impressions of these strangers and getting rest, so that they may begin to form some sort of plan tomorrow.


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spacekru figure out their next move.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think things will really start moving along in the next chapter, so bear with me for now.

          Once she's tucked Sonia into bed, Emori comes over to join the circle that Murphy and the others have formed on the floor in the far corner of their dorm-style room from the sleepy child. She settles beside Murphy, wrapping her arm around his waist, and he does the same; they all sit and wait in awkward silence for several minutes until the sound of Sonia's quiet snores provides steady reassurance she's asleep and, more importantly, oblivious to the adult fear that, if the others are anything like Murphy, grips all their stomachs like a thing with claws.

          “So,” Bellamy says finally, taking the lead as usual – Clarke would be proud – “what did we find out at dinner?”

          “They grow great beef,” Monty says.

          Bellamy shoots Monty that heavy stare that, though he'd never tell anyone this, used to turn Murphy on a little. “For real, Monty,” he says, and Monty hangs his head and bites his lip, thinking it over.

          “They're prisoners,” Monty says, finally. “Or at least, they were. I'm guessing the prison system sort of disintegrated after the bombs.”

          “Did it, though?” Murphy says. “It seemed to survive just fine in space.”

          “If the people who'd imprisoned them had been in space, they would have been on the Ark, and we would have known about the prisoners,” Monty says.

          “Because the Ark shared everything with us,” Murphy says. “That's why they locked Clarke up with the stoners and the arsonists and the – whatever Harper did. Freedom of information.”

          “Point,” Monty says, after floundering a moment and failing to find a rebuttal. Murphy smirks. “Still, with only four hundred people on the Ark at the beginning, it's not that likely.”

          “I'll give you that,” Murphy says. He leans his head back against the wall. “Anyways, yeah, they're all prisoners. And their leader is a bitch who kind of implied that she killed her husband, so I'm not placing any bets on them being trustworthy or sane, even in comparison to us and the low standards we set for that kind of thing.”

          “Speak for yourself,” Bellamy says, and Murphy rolls his eyes and sticks out his tongue. “Okay. Prisoners, murderers – what else?”

          “Out of touch,” Raven says. “They were referring to the planet as green before Murphy set them straight. They've missed two apocalypses. Apocali? Whatever. They probably got something of the first Praimfiya – comms cutting out, or something – but, since they never cut back in, they would never have found out about the bombs specifically, or the whole global nuclear shitstorm thing that followed. And they'd have no clue about Praimfiya 2.0.”

          “Can we use that?” Murphy asks.

          “It's hard to know what we can use until we know what they want, both with us and in general,” Raven says.

          “Then how do we find that out?”

          Everyone looks at Emori like they've forgotten she's there, and Murphy grins; he knows Emori prides herself on her ability to fade into the background, and besides that, she's right. Much as he has to admit that Bellamy and Raven have risen to the challenge of leadership Clarke set for them, they and Monty could theorize for ages about what the motives of these Eligius criminals were without getting any closer to actually knowing, while the danger to all eight of them increased with every day of ignorance. Emori's getting right to the point. Bellamy and Raven must realize it, too, because both nod slowly.

          “That's the question,” Raven says. “As for the answer …” She chews on her lip, tapping her fingers on her leg and her foot against the floor. “Their black box would be super useful, but we can't access it without crashing the ship, and I'm guessing that's not on the table.”

          “Not with my daughter on board,” Emori says.

          Raven bites down harder on her lip, tearing at a piece of dead skin with her teeth even when blood begins to well up beneath it. Bellamy takes her hand. “I wish I could remember what Abby had said about deep-space missions,” she says, taking advantage of Bellamy's proffered hand by squeezing it tightly enough to make Bellamy wince, then releasing it again, then squeezing it, like some sort of heartbeat. “It was on Becca's island; I was spacewalking – well, I was … seizing, but I thought I was spacewalking – and Abby said something to Jackson, I heard –” Tears begin to well up in Raven's eyes, and Murphy exchanges a look with Emori that is more designed to keep them from looking at Raven's display of vulnerability – Raven hates witnesses to her displays of vulnerability, Murphy has learned at gunpoint – than to communicate anything between them. Out of the corner of his eye, Murphy can see that Bellamy has joined Raven on the cot she pulled over so she wouldn't have to sit on the floor (difficult because of her leg, which Murphy tries not to think too much about), and is rubbing Raven's shoulder.

          “Raven, shh. Shh. We'll figure it out.” Bellamy sits up straighter, but without moving his hand. He addresses the group. “There's gotta be files on the ship's computers about Eligius, whatever that is, and probably about the crew – what their crimes were, things like that. And a record of any possible transmissions …” He brightens. “If Clarke were alive – she'd know we lacked the fuel to get back down to Earth ourselves. Maybe she –”

          “Not to rain on your parade, Bell,” Murphy says, “but how the hell would Clarke know these psychos who locked us up? And if they had come to rescue us at her behest, then why the fighting and the sedatives and shit? Couldn't they have just been like 'hey, you know Clarke Griffin? She sent us to rescue your asses now come on let's get you bitches back to Earth.”

          Bellamy's shoulders slump, and even Echo looks sympathetic. They all know how much Bellamy has wanted Clarke to be alive all these years, but they also all know how unlikely it is, even with the nightblood she injected into herself instead of Emori (thank god) running through her veins. “Sorry, bud,” Murphy says.

          “No,” Bellamy says, though he still won't look up, and Murphy worries that he's ruined things between the two of them yet again, because this seems to be a specialty of his. “No, you're right. Like Raven said earlier, wishful thinking doesn't do us any good.”

          “Well,” Raven says, a bit too brightly, after another moment of the six of them sitting and staring at a Bellamy Blake who looks like he might be on the verge of tears, and they all look to her instead, grateful for the distraction, “I think it's time to call it a night. We'll reconvene in the morning?”

          “Sonia will be awake,” Emori says.

          “We'll reconvene in shifts, then.” Raven drapes her arm over Bellamy's shoulder and stands up, forcing Bellamy to rise too so that he doesn't twist Raven's shoulder out of its socket. Murphy and Emori stand as well, and go silently to the pair of cots they've pushed together a few feet away from Sonia's bed, trying not to eavesdrop on whatever Raven is saying to Bellamy. They lie down, and Emori buries her face in Murphy's chest. He can feel her anxiety as if it's his own.

          “Hey,” Murphy says, pressing a kiss to the top of Emori's head and faking more confidence than he feels, “we're gonna get out of this just fine. All three of us – hell, all eight of us.” Emori nods.

          “I hope so.”

          “We are,” Murphy says, and he wraps his arms tighter around Emori until they both drift off to sleep.


	5. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spacekru eats breakfast and plans some recon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Featuring copious amounts of sassy Murphy and probably about the amount of Jasper angst you would expect in something written from Monty's POV and canon compliant through the end of season 4.

          The cold cereal he's served for breakfast on the Eligius ship is the best cold cereal Monty has ever tasted – this doesn't ease his suspicion regarding the crew, because the chocolate cake at Mount Weather was delicious, too, but he can't help himself from devouring it with gusto. Five years on nothing but algae salads will do that to a man. Or at least, it will do it to Monty – Bellamy is eating at a normal rate, and Monty's not sure that Murphy's even touched his cereal – he wonders exactly how uncouth it would be to ask if he could have Murphy's portion.

          “Keep eating that fast, Monty, and sooner or later you're going to choke on something.” Bellamy raises an eyebrow at Monty's empty bowl, and Monty swallows the last of the cereal in his mouth so quickly he almost does.

          “Sorry, Bellamy,” Monty says, grabbing his water glass and gulping down some water to combat the tears in his eyes.

          “It's not me you have to apologize to,” Bellamy says, scooping up another spoonful of cereal. “It's yourself, when that stuff goes down the wrong pipe and you suddenly can't breathe.”

          “And me, when I've gotta stop whatever I'm doing to Heimlich you because no one else knows how,” Murphy says. Bellamy looks at Murphy and rolls his eyes.

          “Shut up, Murphy.”

          “Aye, aye, captain.” Murphy mock-salutes, and it's a good thing Monty doesn't have cereal in his mouth anymore, because it would be messy when he snorts, and Murphy, noticing his amusement, winks at him (it's also a good thing he's not holding anything, because Murphy's weird flirtatiousness always causes him to stumble).

          “It's so good to be eating something that isn't algae salad,” Monty says. “No offense to Murphy's cooking, but five years of the same thing would get old no matter what the thing was.” He looks across the table at Olivia, whose own bowl of cereal is half-full, but who is watching Monty and his friends instead of eating. “Thank you,” he says, “for rescuing us from that, if nothing else.” Monty can feel everyone else's eyes on him, and tries to convince himself, with moderate success, that the comment is tactically advisable. Olivia laughs.

          “We know plenty about bad food,” Olivia says. “Hell, this isn't exactly gourmet cooking.” Murphy hums in agreement. “But it's variety for you, I suppose, and if you've eaten the same thing every day for five years, then variety's what you need.”

          “Damn right.” Murphy raises his water glass; when no one knocks theirs against his, he looks around the table, seemingly confused and disappointed. “No one for a toast?” He brings his glass to his lips, drinks, and sets it down. “All right then. I see how it is.” Emori laughs.

          “So,” Murphy says, conversationally, “what do you do to pass the time on this ship? Is there a board game closet somewhere? We could get out Scrabble, and Echo could put down words in Trigedasleng even though not all of us _speak_ the language that well, and then we could put down words in any language we knew, meaning that the guy who's basically monolingual is at a distinct disadvantage, and then he could recruit his little polyglot daughter to his team, and kick everyone else's asses anyways.” He looks down at Sonia where she sits between her parents, stirring the cereal as though she's fascinated by the texture of it. “Would you like that, baby girl?” Monty stares at Sonia, moving the viscous cereal about with her spoon. _Jasper could explain the chemistry of that_ , he thinks, a shadow falling over him the way it always does when the thought of Jasper crosses his mind. _Jasper could have taught Sonia so many things._ He thinks of all the gaps the dead have left in Sonia's education – no chemistry, no art, no medicine, a truly limited repertoire of practical jokes – and thinks he might drown in the sense of loss it gives him, until Emori speaks – to the whole group, really, but, from the curious, concerned stare she gives Monty, he knows, to him.

          “I'm not dealing with you and Scrabble again, John. How about Sorry?”

          “You only like Sorry because you kick everyone's ass at it, 'Mori.”

          “We don't have a board game closet,” Olivia says. “We spent most of our journey into space in cryosleep. Easier to control criminals that way.”

          “Maybe Jaha should have tried that,” Murphy mutters, and Bellamy once again shoots him the look that, on the ground, Monty and Jasper had almost immediately dubbed the “shut up, Murphy” look. Murphy hangs his head; Monty admires Bellamy for many reasons, among them that he seems to be the only person who can truly make Murphy feel shame. “Sorry,” Murphy mutters.

          “Your sass is a lovely addition to some conversations, but it's too early in the morning for it now,” Bellamy says. “What is there to do? Anything we can help you with”

          “Well, we could use some assistance making preparations for the return trip,” Olivia admits. “Once those are done, though, I'm afraid there's nothing. We used to have a simulation that would keep our minds active even in cryosleep, but it cut out five years ago for reasons beyond even us.”

          “Joy,” Murphy says. “We're all gonna get cabin fever.”

          “What do you specifically need help with?” Bellamy asks Olivia, ignoring Murphy. Olivia purses her lips and taps her chin.

          “We need to set our course,” Olivia says, “is the main thing. We used to have an automatic system, but things break down with time, you know. After that, during travel, it will just be maintaining the farm and the lab.”

          “Monty? Raven?” Bellamy says. Monty is already looking at him, and Raven looks up from her nearly empty bowl of cereal and nods at Bellamy.

          “Yeah?”

          “Would you guys be willing to help out Olivia and crew today? You're the best we have when it comes to technology.”

          “Damn right we are.” 

          “I'll help, too,” Echo says, startling both Monty and his friends and the crew of the Eligius. “I have some experience with navigation.”

          “Welcome to the team,” Raven says. She turns to Olivia. “Before we get to work, though, do you guys have showers? I think we could all benefit from one.”

          “Speak for yourself,” Murphy mutters, but Olivia nods. “I'll show you to the women's showers; Garrett, take the gentlemen to the men's.”

          “Oh, no,” Raven says rapidly. “We can all share the showers, so long as there are enough stalls.” She wants to talk to Bellamy, and possibly Monty and Echo as well, in private, Monty realizes, before she and he and Echo go off to assist the Eligius crew with setting their course. It's a good plan, and Monty nods in support of it, as does Bellamy. Olivia raises her eyebrows and gives them a smile that suggests she thinks they all want to go to showers together for a reason other than conspiracy, but acquiesces with a nod. Monty breathes an internal sigh of relief.

          “Well, if you're all done with your cereal, I'll trust Marco and Lewis to clear the table and take you all to where you can get washed up, and then Raven and Monty can come help Garrett and I with our course.” The seven of them stand from the table, and Emori pushes Sonia's bowl away from her and makes her get out of her seat as well.

          “We'll have another meal later, yongon,” Emori says.

          Olivia leaves the dining hall, and Bellamy and Raven follow her, followed by Monty, Harper, Emori, Sonia, and Murphy, and Echo taking up the back like a bodyguard. Something in Monty's stomach twists now that he's on his feet, like he's only just gotten into something he can't get out of, and Harper, attuned to his emotions after their just over two years of dating and three now as close friends, reaches down and takes his hand. Monty is grateful for the contact, and squeezes, trying to press down the discomfort he feels and focus on what he has to do.

* * *

           They turn three of the showers on just in case there are security cameras or a crew member lingering outside the door, and then Bellamy gathers them into a close little circle where hopefully they will be able to talk without being overheard. “So,” he says, “today we do recon. Raven, Monty, sorry for volunteering you without asking you first. Echo, thanks for volunteering.”

          Echo nods, back to being her usual solemn and silent self.

          “It's fine,” Monty tells Bellamy, partly to break the silence, and partly because really, it is; he understands. Raven spent all of her work hours on the Ring working with the computers and other assorted technology, most recently on the navigational task of figuring out how to get the eight of them safely back to the part of Earth that didn't suck, and Monty spent the work hours he didn't spend at the algae farm with Harper and Echo working with Raven.

          Bellamy offers Monty a grateful smile. “Thanks.”

          “Of course,” Monty says. Bellamy smiles again, and then returns to addressing Raven and Echo as well.

          “All we want from today is basic information, more solid footing.” Bellamy looks sternly at Raven. “Please don't do anything impulsive or dangerous, even if it's really damn tempting.”

          “Language,” says Murphy.

          “No wild risks,” Raven says, nodding sharply at Bellamy. “Got it.” She shifts on her feet, and Monty sees uncertainty in her eyes, which doesn't help his stomach or his nerves. Maybe he shouldn't have eaten his breakfast so quickly, he thinks, because now he feels kind of like puking. “What if they plan to … float us, though, or something?”

          Bellamy opens his mouth, but Emori speaks first. “If they wanted to do such a thing, they'd have done it already. You don't wait for the beast to wake before you slay it; no one cares that much about a fair fight.” Raven inhales, then exhales, lowering her shoulders, and smiles weakly at Emori.

          “Fair. Thanks.”

          “Of course,” Emori says simply.

          Raven nods. She looks up at Bellamy. “So, what do we want to accomplish?”

          “There are keypads on every door to open them from the outside,” Harper says. “The codes would be useful. If we're lucky, they'll all be the same, but even if they're not, independent access to one room is better than independent access to none.”

          “True,” Bellamy says. “Good thinking, Harper.”

          Harper smiles. “I do my best.”

          “It's good,” Bellamy says. “Okay, so codes for the keypads are a priority. Also just generally getting your bearings with respect to the ship would be helpful, I expect. And if you happen to overhear anything useful that Olivia and Garrett say, well, that couldn't hurt to know, either.”

          “Keypads, bearings, eavesdropping,” Raven says. “Got it.”

          Bellamy nods at Raven. “Monty? Echo? You good?” Both nod, and Bellamy folds his hands together. “Just step in the showers a second to get your hair and your skin wet, hold up our cover, and then go get us that recon. I really appreciate your doing this.”

          “'Course,” Raven says, and Monty nods.

          “Always know your enemy,” Echo says, and the somberness that has permeated the room throughout their conversation like steam from the hot showers falls over Monty's friends. Emori hugs Sonia to her side, murmuring what Monty assumes are comforting words in Trigedasleng, and Murphy stands behind her with his arms around her waist.

          Monty steps into a shower, relishing the feel of the water for a moment before he turns it off and steps out, dripping slightly, but his clothes, thankfully, still mostly dry. He nods at Bellamy trying to feign confidence he doesn't feel. Raven and Echo, both also damp, are waiting for him.

          “See you later,” Monty says to Bellamy; the words “on the other side” almost but not quite slipping out of his mouth to punch him in the gut. Bellamy nods, and Monty knows from his eyes that he hears the words Monty has held back from saying.

          “Later,” Bellamy says, and Monty turns and follows Raven and Echo out the door.

  
  



	6. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Echo, Raven, and Monty help reboot some tech, and Spacekru eats lunch with their captors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've only got like two more chapters actually plotted, so enjoy the quick updates while they last!

          They find Olivia and her second, the man named Garrett, waiting for them outside the doors to the dining hall, and fall into step behind the pair to be led to the room in which they will be charting their course. The halls of the Eligius ship make Echo bristle; she had almost gotten used to the rhythm of the Ark, to the hum of its machinery and its cold iron glint, but this vibrating, claustrophobic contraption of burnished metal is something new, and she doesn't like it. Not that she likes anything new, but still. This ship gives her a profound sense of unease.

          Raven lays a hand on Echo's arm, and Echo looks over at her, startled. “You good?” she asks, her eyes concerned.

          Echo somehow finds the strength in herself, despite her nerves, to manage a nod. “Yes. I just – don't like new places.”

          “Change can be a bitch,” Raven says.

          They turn a corner and walk a little ways down a hall, and Olivia stops in front of a door. Echo watches her press numbered buttons on the front of a small box attached to the wall. _Keypad_ , she thinks, and takes note of the order of the numbers Olivia presses: 3-2-5-7. The corner of her gaze meets the corner of Raven's, and they nod at one another, a sign that they both have taken in the code for at the very least this door, which now slides open by some unseen mechanism to reveal a room of moderate size. Olivia steps in, followed by Garrett, Monty, and Echo and Raven. Echo looks around, taking stock of the room. It reminds her of Becca Pramheda's lab, gleaming white and drawn in clean, unnatural lines.

          “Well,” Olivia says, turning to Echo and her ilk. “Let's see what's to be done.” She opens her mouth to start her list of tasks, but Raven interrupts.

          “Where are we charting a course _to_?” Raven asks, and both Echo and Monty look to her. It isn't a question Echo had even considers, although she feels foolish, now, for not considering it; it's something of utmost importance. She's minimally comforted by the fact that it appears as though Monty hadn't considered it, either.

          “Oh, of course. That is something you should know if you're to help us, isn't it?”

          “Yup,” Raven says.

          “We have a colony out towards the edge of the solar system, on a little hunk of rock quite rich in minerals, among other things. We were sent to mine it in 2038. Things didn't quite go according to Eligius' plans, but that's a story for another time. It's not relevant to the task at hand.”

          Raven has lost herself in thought the way she sometimes does, and Echo lays a hand on her elbow as she did for Echo earlier. Raven starts. She flashes Echo a smile when she sees it's Echo's touch that has brought her back to herself. “Okay,” she says. “So, what needs doing to get us there?”

          “We have to reboot this old system first,” Olivia says, gesturing at an assortment of boxes and cords beneath a counter and some screens set into the wall that Echo recognizes as a computer system. “We need it to sort out which way is which, and, once we get closer, it will allow us to contact the colony, which will in turn provide for our safe landing.” 

          “Computers are our specialty,” Raven says with a smile. Echo's hands curl into fists at her sides as she tries to ignore the bite of casual exclusion; she should be used to it by now, to the sky people aside from Sonia among her clan forgetting that she, too, is one of their strange, fire-forged _them_ , but the sting in her heart whenever one of them reinforces this seems like it will never go away.

          Raven turns to face Echo and Monty. “So, which one of you bitches wants to get under there and connect some fucking wires?” she asks.

          Monty looks at Echo. “I did it last time,” he says.

          “Last time?”

          “Booting up the cameras on the Ark,” Raven says. “He's right. Would you do the honors, Echo?”

          “Why not?” Echo drops into a crouch, and then onto her belly, snaking her way beneath the counter. It's cool under there, and dark, and she can almost imagine, if she closes her eyes, that she is in a cave somewhere, but for the brightness behind her from the main part of the room, and the claustrophobia that comes from the computers like barriers around her and the cords like cruel vines. “What do I do?” she calls back to Raven.

          Echo hears some shuffling – Raven bending over, and Monty coming up behind her in case her leg gives out and she falls – and then Raven's voice. “Okay, this is a lot like the system on the Ark, actually. That's good. I guess they would have been made about the same time, so that makes sense. Anyways … you see that red cord, the one that's thicker than the rest?”

          Echo tries to nod, but finds she can't move her head enough in the small space. “Yes,” she calls out to Raven.

          “Good. That's the power cord. Is it plugged into anything?”

          Echo takes the rope-thick cord in her hands and feels her way along it until she reaches the back wall. “It goes into the back wall,” she says.

          “Okay. What about the other end, though?”

          Echo feels her way back along the cord. “A box,” she says.

          “A computer?”

          “Yes.”

          “Shit. Okay, try pulling the cord out of the computer – gently.”

          Echo tugs at the end of the cord, and a little metal bit at the end of the rubber snake comes free from the computer. “Yes?” she calls to Raven.

          “You did it? Okay, now try plugging it back in.”

          “Pull the plug and plug it back in?” Monty says, and Echo pauses to listen to him. “That's what you're trying?”

          “It's the simplest possible solution,” Raven tells him. “If it doesn't work, we'll try something more complicated.”

          “You're the boss,” Monty says.

          “Damn right.”

          The argument between Raven and Monty seemingly over, Echo plugs the cord back into the same computer she pulled it from. She waits. Nothing happens. There are no reactions from either her people or the crew members of the Eligius who can see what's going on.

          “Did you plug it into the same outlet as you did the first time?” Raven asks eventually, and Echo can see the shadow of her body lean further under the counter to peer into the darkness.

          “Outlet?” Echo asks.

          “The same – um, dammit, I don't know how to describe it. That's already the layman's term. Monty?”

          “The little holes in the computer,” Monty says. “Did you plug it into the same little hole you pulled it from?”

          “Oh,” Echo says, cheeks burning because _of course_ ; she should have been able to work out that that was necessary. “No,” she calls back. “Give me a moment; I'll do it now.” She pulls the cord from the computer again, and plugs it back into the same little hole. A light on the computer, previously dark, turns green, and the room hums.

          “Yes!” Raven says. “Great. Can you get out yourself, Echo, or do you need some help?”

          “I can get out myself,” Echo says, snaking backwards until she has space to roll over and stand up. Raven offers her a hand, and, though she doesn't need it, she accepts it anyways, offering Raven a smile.

          “Now we all can get to the real work!” Raven says cheerfully. Echo turns around to look at the screens, coming to life now that the power cord is properly plugged in. She doesn't understand what any of them say, but at least, she thinks, she's here, making an effort for the sake of herself and her clan. For a woman once banished, it could be far, far worse.

* * *

 

          They meet up with the rest of both Echo and Olivia's clans in the dining hall for lunch – a man Olivia calls Victor and a woman she calls Washington serve them something called sandwiches, which Echo has never seen before but with which the sky people among her clan seem to be familiar. She picks hers up, turns it over in her hands, takes a bite; it is thick and spongy in her mouth, and mostly tasteless but for little hints of sweetness and sharpness and every once in a while. It is difficult to swallow around bites of the sandwich, but she knows that she should take advantage of this situation of having three meals a day for as long as it lasts, so she reigns in her disgust and chews, swallows, chews, swallows.

          “So,” Raven says, and Echo looks up; everyone except for Harper, who eats in tiny birdlike bites, has finished their sandwich, “ Olivia, now that we've got your course basically charted, I hope you don't mind my asking if you and your crew could do us a small favor?”

          “Of course not,” Olivia says, spreading her hands in a grand, king-like gesture. “Ask away.”

          “We have … friends back on Earth we should be reuniting with around now. If you could take us back to our planet – I could hook up some Earth monitoring equipment for you to help you find the right place to land – it would be much appreciated. We were going to go back in a couple of weeks as it was.”

          Olivia's lips make a thin line, and something nervous tugs at Echo's stomach. “I'm afraid we can't do that,” she says. “To return to Earth, for us, would be to return to captivity, something none of us have any desire to do. I'm sure you can understand.”

          “There's no one left there to hold you captive,” Bellamy says, and Echo looks up at him, her heart beating rapidly in her chest; something tells her that divulging this information is a bad idea. “If you want to return to your people, I understand, but there's no danger in dropping us off first. My sister is down there waiting for me. I can't let her –” Bellamy's voice breaks, and a tear spills from one of his eyes. Despite herself, Echo wants to reach out and lay a hand on his shoulder, but Raven, on his other side has her covered.

          “Shh, Bell,” Raven murmurs. “Shh.”

          “I can't let her think I'm dead,” Bellamy finishes, and Raven shuts her eyes and bites down hard on her lip – things she does, Echo thinks, to stop herself from crying.

          “Do you have radios?” Raven asks. “You have to let us at least contact our people down there, if we can.”

          “We've blocked all Earth frequencies from our radios,” Olivia says. “But I'll tell you what; if there is, as you say, no one left down there to hold us captive, we will return to Earth eventually. But first we must return to our colony, or at least within range of it, to let them know this news. If you speak truthfully, Bellamy, you have made a hundred poor prisoners, ourselves included, joyful beyond words.” Echo doesn't trust the smile that Olivia smiles then; she looks over at Emori, the best among them at reading faces, and sees in her eyes that she doesn't, either. She and Emori share a dark look; Echo notices that Emori is gripping Sonia's hand under the table.

          “If that's the best we can get,” Raven says, her own smile forced, “then I suppose we've got no choice than to take you up on it. Thank you.”

          “Of course,” Olivia says.

          Raven pushes her plate towards the center of the table and pushes back her chair, standing up. She looks about at the seven still-seated members of their clan. “Come on,” she says, and Echo stands as well, as do the rest, “let's go to our dorm.”


	7. Chapter Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Spacekru discusses when and how they're going to see Earth again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little on the short side, and not much happens, but a necessary chapter nonetheless. The next one will be more active, and hopefully will come sooner after this one is than this one has after the last.

          Harper sits perched on her cot, knees pulled into her chest, watching Bellamy pace back and forth across the room; she can feel the others, sitting and standing about on or by their own beds, doing the same. Bellamy's like a hurricane – anger, fear, sadness seem to have manifested physically around him, and to be carving space out of the air as he walks. Harper wants nothing more than to reach out a hand and lay it on his shoulder, but she's worried she'd be swept away by the wind that follows in Bellamy's wake. Raven seems to share her concern – she hovers by the pair of cots she and Bellamy have pushed together to make a bed, shifting on her toes like she's a moment away from moving, but never really budging from her spot.

          “Ten years,” Bellamy says, finally, crashing down into a sitting position on his bed. Raven kneels behind him instantly, rubbing his shoulders for a moment before simply laying her hand on top of his. “Ten years until I see my sister again. I'll be nearly forty.”

          “Not if we enter cryosleep,” Emori offers. “It won't feel like a day if we freeze ourselves. And you won't age, either.”

          “I'd end up younger than her,” Bellamy says. His voice is rough, broken, more so than it was after Clarke left Arkadia following everything that happened at Mount Weather, more so than it was in their early days back on the Ark, when they all were struggling to adjust to the fact that Clarke – fiercely loyal, unfailingly practical, sometimes ruthless Clarke – was probably dead somewhere on the face of that burning planet. Harper feels sympathy twist in her gut, the sound of Bellamy's suffering like stepping on broken glass. “I couldn't – I'm her big brother.”

          “If I had someone waiting for me down there,” Murphy says, “I think seeing them again as soon as possible would be outweigh maintaining my pride.” Bellamy glares at him, brows knit, and he adds, “but to each their own, I guess.”

          The room is filled for a moment with nothing but the sound of Emori murmuring to Sonia in Trigedasleng. Everything feels empty, and too still, and Harper rises from her bed to go to Monty's, leaning back to lie with her head in his lap. His brow is creased with worry, his lips turned slightly down, but something in his eyes softens when she meets them with hers – they may not be dating anymore, but his touch and his smile are still the things most reliably able to comfort her. “We got the code for the doors,” Monty says, finally. “Or for the control room, at least, which is a valuable door to have the code to.”

          “Three two five seven,” Echo says. Harper sits up to look at Echo, but Echo's eyes are focused on Bellamy, so Harper turns on her knees to follow Echo's gaze.

          Bellamy takes a deep, ragged breath and shakes his head, then returns Echo's stare. “That's good,” he says, still a little hoarse. “Thanks, Echo, Raven, Monty.”

          “Of course,” Echo says.

          Raven slides from where she's been kneeling behind Bellamy to sit on the bed beside him, legs dangling over the edge. “Now what do we do with it?”

          “Look at what they've got on their computers,” Monty says. “That would be the first thing, I'd think. We could do it at night, or, well, when Olivia and her crew are asleep; I'm sure I could access parts of the system, at least; the whole thing might be tricky, since I imagine there are some serious security measures to protect things from the convicts who staff the ship.”

          “Now, why would anyone mistrust a convict?” Murphy says.

          “If you don't have anything useful to say, then don't say anything.”

          “Murphy's needless snark aside,” Raven says, “Monty's onto something. Anything we can get from their computers would be great. I wish I still knew how to code, but –”

          “I can handle it,” Monty says.

          “Thanks, Monty,” Bellamy says. He runs a hand through his hair. “They said their automatic navigation system broke down, which is why they needed help to chart their course – do you know if autopilot might have broken down as well?”

          “It might have,” Raven says. She shifts to look Bellamy in the eye. “What are you thinking?”

          “A Penelope gambit.”

          “In English, please,” Murphy says.

          “Penelope? Like in the Odyssey?” Harper thinks she knows what Bellamy is talking about, but she's not certain, so she, as well as the other six, stay silent. Bellamy lets out a beleaguered moan. “In the Odyssey,” he says, “Penelope is Odysseus's wife, and the queen of Ithaca. When Odysseus goes off to fight in the Trojan War, a bunch of suitors flock to Penelope, and after fifteen years or so of Odysseus' absence, they convince her that she needs to make a decision about which one of them she'll marry, because they think Odysseus has to be dead after all this time. But Penelope believes that her husband is alive, and she intends to remain faithful to him. So she tells her suitors that she's weaving a shroud for her ailing father-in-law, Laertes, and that she'll only choose among them once she's finished weaving the shroud. The thing is, every night she goes back and undoes the progress she's made during the day, so that she never finishes the shroud, and never has to choose among her suitors.”

          “And then what?”

          “And then eventually Odysseus comes back and kills all the suitors, and the pressure for Penelope to choose among them someday ends.”

          “I don't see how this relates to our situation,” Echo says, and murmurs of agreement rise from the rest of them, Harper included.

          “If people have to pilot this ship directly,” Bellamy says, “and the Eligius crew pilots it towards their colony each day, then each night we can pilot it back towards Earth, erasing the damage they've done.”

          “Only we don't have an Odysseus to come and save us,” Raven reminds him gently. “If anything, we'd _be_ the Odysseus; we're the ones who went away to sea. Well, space, but – you know what I mean.”

          “Yeah,” Bellamy says. “I do. You make a good point.”

          “Besides,” Emori says, and they all look up at her, slightly startled, “they said they'd bring us back to Earth eventually, _once_ they had spoken to their people. If we prevent them from making contact with their colony by preventing them from nearing it on this ship, then we prevent ourselves from ever going back to Earth. If we could overpower them, that would be different, but doing damage control with respect to our distance from Earth would only be prolonging our captivity.”

          “So we sit passively and take it?” Bellamy asks.

          “If that's our best option,” Harper says, “then it's our best option. I know that I, for one, just want to get back as soon as I can. Ten years is a long time, but it's not as long as fifteen, or twenty.”

          “I hate this,” Bellamy sighs, tilting his head back. Harper feels tears pricking at the backs of her eyes – the people she's now closest to are all here with her (it's hard to survive five years in space together without developing a quiet, unbreakable sort of intimacy), but the thought of ten more years without seeing the people she's left on Earth, without seeing Miller, or Octavia, or Kane, is still enough to hollow out her chest and weigh down her heart with rocks. “You're right, you are, but I hate this.”

          “None of us like it, Bellamy,” Murphy says. Behind her back, Harper hears him take a sharp, shuddering breath. “Sonia will be fourteen years old by the time she sees the ground. It's younger than I was, or you, or any of us except Emori and Echo, but it's older than some. It's older than I was when they locked me up on the Ark.”

          “Shh, John,” Emori says.

          Bellamy buries his face in his hands, and Raven wraps an arm over his shoulders. “Monty, Echo, and I should get back to the control room; there's some preliminary navigation work still to be done. We'll figure out our next moves after dinner.” Bellamy nods, still dejected, and Raven squeezes him. “We'll get through this, yeah? I'm with you, always, and you're with me, and the rest of these suckers are at the very least resigned to being along for the ride.”

          “Love you, too, Raven,” Murphy says.

          “Shut up, Murphy.” Raven stands, and Monty slides off of his bed where he's been sitting behind Harper. “Come on, guys,” Raven says to Monty and Echo, and they come to stand in front of her where she's got her back to the door. She turns around. “Let's figure out how to get this ship to Pluto and back as fast as is fucking possible.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> I live for feedback so please comment!!


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